Nicaragua, Victory U.S. Fair Play

By David K. Shipler; David K. Shipler is a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Published: March 1, 1990

WASHINGTON—
The Nicaraguan election has proved that open, honorable support for a democratic process is one of the most powerful foreign policy tools at Washington's disposal. It is more effective than the sordid practice of using the Central Intelligence Agency to engineer coups and secretly finance political parties. It is more legitimate than military force, and, in this case, it has been more decisive.

In dislodging the Sandinistas, Nicaraguan voters have done peacefully what the U.S.-backed contras could not do violently. The few million U.S. dollars that financed international election observers and made the centrist opposition viable were much better spent than the hundreds of millions that purchased weapons and cost thousands of lives.

Some will argue that without the contras' military pressure, President Daniel Ortega Saavedra would not have agreed to hold elections at all. It is true that partly because of the confrontation with the U.S., Nicaragua's economy suffered terribly, setting the stage for the widespread public discontent with the Sandinistas reflected in Sunday's balloting.

But few governments become moderate during a war; the contra war strengthened Sandinista hard-liners and probably contributed to their oppressive policies. The way to resolution opened only when Congress suspended the war, in effect, to give the Sandinistas a chance to proceed democratically. International scrutiny, spurred by President Oscar Arias of Costa Rica, provided the context in which voting could be conducted in a relatively free atmosphere.

By that time, considerable groundwork had been laid for about five years with small grants from the National Endowment for Democracy, a nongovernmental institution wholly funded by Congress. La Prensa, the opposition newspaper of the new President-elect, Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, was kept afloat with newsprint and other supplies subsidized by the endowment. Money went to build a centrist democratic movement, to bolster an independent trade union, to train oppositionists in organization and campaign techniques and to persuade voters to register.

Thus, Nicaragua's election has vindicated Washington's fledgling program of providing public, above-board funding to help democratic procedures take root in countries with authoritarian regimes.

But there are cautionary notes and subtler morals to this story. One is the virtue of supporting the electoral process rather than a particular party.

Last fall the Bush Administration foolishly proposed making direct contributions to the opposition's campaign. The endowment was poised to convey the funds until some of its supporters on Capitol Hill objected; the endowment's board then voted to rebuff the Administration and hew to the line that had been drawn elsewhere in the past: funds to enhance the fairness of the election, not to promote the success of a candidate.

The line was quite thin in Nicaragua. Congress voted $9 million, most of which went through the endowment, to help the opposition level the playing field against the Sandinistas' power to muster the resources of government. Under the law, the opposition could use U.S. funds to purchase cars, fax machines and other equipment - but not to buy bumper stickers, produce buttons or print campaign posters. The distinction was probably lost on most Nicaraguans, although the opposition obviously overcame the stigma of being Washington's client.

Significantly, the nonpartisan funding proved the most important - for the get-out-the-vote campaign, in which Nicaraguans were reassured repeatedly that their ballots would be secret, and for the monitoring teams, which publicized and curtailed Sandinista harassment of oppositionists.

The money intended to help Mrs. Chamorro's campaign most directly was probably the least effective. Most equipment and payments were delayed by Sandinista bureaucrats until the last three weeks, too late to have much impact. Her victory suggests that such campaign aid was unnecessary.

Now the Administration has pledged economic aid, but Nicaragua also needs help in building democratic institutions - an effective legislature, an independent judiciary and a free press. A strong U.S. commitment to that effort would be a sign of a lesson learned.